Two-year-old boy shoots and kills father in Florida

Local authorities said Monday that a two-year-old boy accidentally killed his father in Florida after shooting him with a loaded gun that his parents had left unattended.

Police went to the victim's residence near Orlando, central Florida on May 26 after receiving an emergency call.

When they arrived, officers found that a woman, Marie Ayala, was giving a cardiac massage to her husband, Reggie Mabry, who had been shot.

The 26-year-old man died shortly afterward at the hospital, and police initially thought he had committed suicide, Orange County Sheriff John Mina told a news conference.

But the oldest of the couple's three children, a five-year-old boy, informed officers that it was his two-year-old brother who had shot his father in the back, the sheriff added.

The little boy found the gun in a bag Mabry had left on the floor and shot his father while he was playing a video game on a computer, according to court documents.

The entire family consisting of the parents, the two boys, and a five-month-old girl were in the only bedroom of the home when the events occurred.

Sheriff Mina said that parents Mabry and Ayala were on probation after committing child neglect and narcotics offenses.

Following the death of her husband, police arrested the child's mother for involuntary manslaughter, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and violation of probation, local media reported.

Reggie Mabry, 26 - the father tragically shot & killed by his 2-year-old - should not even have had a gun. He & his wife, Marie Ayala, are convicted felons.

Ayala is now in jail on charges incl. Manslaughter by Culpable Negligence & Possession of a Firearm by a Convicted Felon. pic.twitter.com/wLuQdnN1U9

— Orange County Sheriff's Office (@OrangeCoSheriff) June 6, 2022

"Gun owners who fail to properly secure their guns are a split second away from one of these tragedies occurring in their homes," Mina lamented.

"Now these children have lost both of their parents. Their father is dead. Their mother is in jail. And a child has to live knowing that he shot his father," he added.

The events came amid the debate over gun control in the United States following a string of shootings, including the one that left 19 children dead at a Texas school on May 24.